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This conversation is all about driving change towards a robust, viable reuse economy, and I’m delighted to introduce you to Sydney Harris and Jennifer Carrigan of Upstream, a nonprofit that works to support sustainable, equitable reuse systems across North America.
Sydney Harris is Upstream’s Policy Director, and Jennifer Carrigan is Director of Strategic Initiatives.
Upstream works to normalise reuse, to support the expansion of the reuse sector, and to foster supportive policy measures. Founded over 20 years ago, Upstream could see that reuse is better from an economic perspective as well as being better for people and planet. Upstream works across the US and Canada on reuse systems for packaging and food-ware.
We discuss the benefits and challenges of promoting reuse, and how reuse offers environmental, economic, and workforce development advantages, including reducing pollution and creating local jobs.
Sydney and Jennifer tell us about some of Upstream’s packaging and food-ware projects, and how it advocates for a policy environment that supports reuse.
We hear about a groundbreaking project to set up a reuse system in the Grand Canyon National Park, overcoming challenges including water availability and interactions with wildlife.
Jennifer and Sydney debunk the big myth that people aren’t ready for reuse, and they explain how reuse can improve both consumer experiences AND brand loyalty.
Lastly, they share a bit about some of Upstream’s excellent free resources and support for anyone interested in reuse, wherever they are.
Podcast host Catherine Weetman helps businesses use circular, regenerative and fair solutions to do better, with less.
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Read on for more on our guest and links to the people, organisations and other resources we mention.
Links for our guests:
- Sydney Harris on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sydneyharris/
- Jen Carrigan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferhillcarrigan/
- Upstream Website: https://upstreamsolutions.org
- Subscribe to Upstream’s newsletter right from the homepage!
- The Indisposable Podcast: https://upstreamsolutions.org/podcast
- Upstream Blog: https://upstreamsolutions.org/blog for the Myth Busting Series, sort the blog page by the myth busting category on the left-hand menu, and check out Upstream’s myth busting cheat-sheet
- Upstream on Facebook: @upstreamsolutions.org
- Upstream on LinkedIn: @upstreamsolution
- Upstream on Instagram: @upstreamsolutions
- Grand Canyon Project: https://upstreamsolutions.org/about-the-grand-canyon-project
Books, people and organisations we mentioned
- US Plastics Pact Retail Reuse Initiative: https://usplasticspact.org/u-s-plastics-pact-launches-next-phase-of-reuse-in-retail-initiative-to-bring-scalable-cost-effective-real-world-implementation-to-u-s-stores/
Guest bios
Jennifer Carrigan serves as the Director of Strategic Initiatives at Upstream, a nonprofit that works to spark sustainable, equitable reuse systems across North America. She collaborates closely with other team members on projects that help transform large-scale food service and concession infrastructure, including the South Rim reuse system at the Grand Canyon, into scaled reuse initiatives.
Prior to her work at Upstream, Jennifer worked at a global NGO designing and orchestrating collaborations between community organizations and corporations to create durable circular economy solutions. She also led a non-profit community collaborative focused on accelerating regional circular solutions in North Carolina called Circular Triangle.
She is trained in Lean Six Sigma organizational change management methodologies, program development and evaluation, knowledge management, and community organizing.
Jennifer is passionate about outdoor recreation and access to green space and spends a lot of time hiking, rock climbing, and kayaking. Jennifer received her master’s in Public Health from the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill with a focus on behavior change.
As policy director at Upstream, Sydney Harris enjoys supporting stakeholders across sectors as they design, pass, and implement strong policies and programs that drive packaging reduction and reuse.
She is recognized for supporting the passage of the nation’s first packaging EPR laws and she continues to support EPR, DRS, and other systemic policies at the state and federal level across the US and Canada. She also co-leads Reuse Maine – a community-based reuse coalition that is working to catalyze the development of reuse systems in the Pine Tree state.
Upstream drives change toward a robust, enduring reuse economy in the US & Canada by normalizing reuse, growing and supporting the reuse industry, and ensuring a supportive policy environment.
Founded in 2003, Upstream was an early visionary, recognizing reuse as not only an environmental necessity but an economic imperative, and positioning it as a transformative solution at the nexus of plastic pollution, climate change, and a just transition.
Upstream works across sectors and provides expertise, system orchestration, open-source assets, a platform that calculates cost and impact, and facilitation to accelerate this transformation.
If you’re new to the circular economy, you might like the ‘getting started’ playlist. There’s also an interactive podcast index, making it easy to find episodes on each of the key circular economy strategies or for a specific market sector. And to dig deeper, please check out Catherine’s award-winning A Circular Economy Handbook, published by Kogan Page.
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